The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) is led by five presidentially appointed commissioners who may be removed from office only for inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office. In 2025, President Trump attempted to fire Commissioners Mary Boyle, Alexander Hoehn-Saric, and Richard Trumka Jr. without cause, in violation of the CPSC’s governing statute. President Trump asserts that the CPSC’s leadership structure is unconstitutional because it allows the President to remove the agency’s commissioners only for good cause, not at will. After the Commissioners sued, a federal district court held that the firings were unlawful, and the Trump administration appealed this ruling. In August 2025, CAC filed an amicus brief in the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in support of the Commissioners.  

President Trump argues that under the Supreme Court’s 2020 decision in Seila Law LLC v. CFPB, the CPSC’s commissioners must be removable at will by the President. Our brief shows why this is wrong.  

We first demonstrate that Seila Law did not call into question the legitimacy of agencies structured like the CPSC, sometimes referred to as multimember independent agencies. As we explain, Seila Law addressed only the relatively new phenomenon of an agency led by a single director who is not removable at will. Based on three unique features of these single-director independent agencies, the Court concluded that they represent a novel intrusion on presidential authority that clashes with constitutional structure. The Court was clear, however, that it was not overruling its precedent upholding similar removal limits for the leaders of “a traditional independent agency, run by a multimember board.” None of the reasons the Supreme Court gave for striking down the leadership structure of the CFPB in Seila Law apply to the CPSC—a traditional multimember agency that resembles agencies dating back 150 years in every constitutionally significant way.   

Our brief next explains why long-established practice has placed the validity of multimember independent agencies like the CPSC beyond doubt. In separation-of-powers cases, courts place significant weight upon historical practice, because it embodies the compromises and working arrangements that the elected branches of government themselves have reached. Congress has been assigning regulatory authority to multimember independent agencies for most of the nation’s history, beginning nearly 150 years ago. Supreme Court decisions, including Seila Law, have consistently confirmed the validity of these traditional agencies.  

Finally, the text and history of the Constitution further underscore the legitimacy of multimember independent agencies. The Constitution does not address removal, and there was no agreement at the Founding that presidents had inherent or exclusive removal authority. Instead, the topic was vigorously debated. Presidential removal authority became accepted over time as a “practical construction” of the President’s executive power under the Constitution. In other words, removal authority was established through historical practice, just like the limits on removal authority that later developed for multimember regulators. These two doctrines do not conflict: both reflect established practice that settled what was initially a constitutional ambiguity. 

In short, the CPSC’s leadership structure is consistent with Supreme Court precedent and established practice, and the attempt to fire the Commissioners without good cause was unlawful.